Category Archives: Recipes

Lentil love

For some reason, I put lentils in a little box where the only use was for stews and soups, i.e., dishes in which I cooked them to mush.  A scrumptious lentil salad (with nice, firm lentils) at a recent church potluck reminded me of the versatility and deliciousness of lentils.

As I browsed Show Me Vegan the other day, I came across this post about Snobby Joes, a vegetarian version of sloppy joes made with, you guessed it, lentils!  Seriously, you have to try this recipe — so good! Click here for the recipe at Post Punk Kitchen.

Growing up, my mom made delicious sloppy joes (except for that one time she left the pan on the stove and almost burned the house down).  I was a bit nervous about how Snobby Joes would stack up next to my memory of my mom’s sloppy joes (the kind with ground beef).  The answer?  This recipe will be part of our regular rotation from now on.

In addition to tasting great, the lentils in Snobby Joes provide lots of healthy plant protein.  On a budget?  This dish leaves you with plenty of green in your wallet.

My Variations

If you’re swimming in tomatoes right now, like we are, you can use fresh tomatoes in place of the tomato sauce and paste.  Just puree some chopped fresh tomatoes in the blender until you have at least 1 1/4 cups of tomato sauce.  This will work best if at least some of the tomatoes are paste tomatoes (less water content).  If you don’t have any paste tomatoes, simply suck out the tomato juice from the cut slices before adding to the blender.  (Alternately, you could squeeze the juice into a bowl and drink it, but Method #1 dirties fewer dishes.)

Cooking the lentils for 20 minutes is important.  More cooking, and you’ll get lentil mush.  Less cooking, and they’ll be a little crunchy.  The fear of mushy lentil scared me into under cooking mine a bit this time around, not bad, but I’ll go for the full twenty next time.

Don’t have buns?  Bread or English muffins work well also.  We enjoyed these on our homemade 100% whole wheat bread.  Open-faced creates the perfect bread to filling ratio.

Photo courtesy of our dying digital camera — gotta love planned obsolescence!

—

Entry to Nupur’s Blog Bites 5: Sandwiches and Wraps

Wood and wheat

Every time I look at other apartments, our wood floors lure me back.  Today, I dug in and gave them a much-needed cleaning.  We sweep them pretty regularly, but cleaning the floor is one of those things, like making the bed and showering, that give me pause, because as soon as I clean it, it’s just going to get dirty again.  (I definitely recommend that you NOT clean the floors before company comes, because large numbers of people tramping in are a surefire way to dirty the floor quickly.)

I started with a thorough sweeping, supplemented with a bit of vacuuming for the hard to reach spots.  No carpet means easy, usually electricity free, cleaning.  I even swept the stairs — no sense leaving them with dirt to track onto the clean floors.

Next came a bucket with a bit of cleaner and water.  I used Biokleen All Purpose Cleaner.  (I’m sure there are some great homemade green cleaner recipes out there — anyone want to share?)  The trick is to make a pretty dilute solution.  You don’t want it soapy, or you’ll have to go back over the floors with water.  I prefer a single pass.

While I was on my hands and knees washing the floor, my bread sat on the sidelines, rising.  Two 100% whole wheat plus* loaves that don’t look like doorstops = success.

Clean enough to eat off of, if you like that sort of thing 😉

—

*I started with this basic 100% whole wheat bread recipe that makes two loaves.  I experimented by adding wheat berries, millet, steel cut oats, sunflower seeds, coarse corn meal, sesame seeds, and poppy seeds.  These additions totaled no more than a combined 3/4 of a cup for the two-loaf recipe.  The trick with the seeds and grains is using a presoak.  I soaked the millet and wheat berries overnight.  I soaked all of the other goodies for about an hour, starting with boiling water.

While I was at work . . .

. . . (on a Saturday), someone worked hard in the garden.

Take that, weeds!

Matthew lined our garden paths with the coffee bean sacks that I painstakingly procured on my “day off” last week (the coffee bean sack saga merits another post).  Among other tasks, there was harvesting to be done.  We finally have tomatoes!

The harvest!

We made Caprese salad sandwiches with the cream of the tomato crop.  We also made gazpacho and a big batch of sauteed yellow squash with onion, garlic, tomato, okra (from the farmers’ market),  and fresh thyme & dill — lunch for the week ahead!

Her Green Soup

A couple of weeks ago, we put some beautiful Swiss chard on the stove to steam.  The other part of our dinner was ready first, and when we sat down to eat, we forgot all about the poor Swiss chard.  The too overcooked to just enjoy as-is greens became the inspiration for Her Green Soup.

I don’t really have a recipe, but here’s what went into the soup: aforementioned over-steamed Swiss chard, baby tatsoi, and garbanzo beans (pureed in broth or water); carrots, onions, yellow squash, and garlic (sauteed in olive oil); salt and pepper.  Serve warm or chilled.

We served Her Green Soup with sides of fresh corn on the cob and our beet salad and enjoyed the leftovers throughout the week.

Caprese salad sandwiches

The moniker “basil, tomato, mozzarella sandwich” always felt a bit cumbersome.  Over the weekend, I realized that “Caprese salad sandwich” works much better.

Caprese salad sandwiches

  • Sliced tomatoes (must be in season and locally grown)
  • Fresh mozzarella, sliced (or substitute avocado for a vegan version)
  • Basil leaves
  • Bread
  • Olive oil
  • Balsamic vinegar (use something good — our favorite is Bistro Blends’ Heirloom Balsamic Vinegar)

Lightly salt tomatoes, if desired.  Spread some olive oil on a piece of bread, then layer tomatoes, mozzarella/avocado, and basil.  Drizzle balsamic over the top and/or pour a shot glass of balsamic to sip with sandwich bites (you know it’s a good balsamic if you’re inclined to sip it).

I made open-faced sandwiches on our homemade 100% whole wheat bread last night, but they’re good with one slice of bread or two.